A Life Worth Living
by WickedGame
Summary: 12. Shounenai. Duo has a very bad day at work. What can make it better? Written for opening day of the gwbakery LJ community.


Title: A Life Worth Living

Author: WickedGame

Archive: FFnet, MediaminerOrg, My LJ

Category: Fluff, romance

Pairing: 1+2

Warnings: Fluffiness abounds! Also, it is a probably overdone/cliched premise, but I wanted to write one. And foul language (my Duo has a potty mouth).

Notes: Written for Opening Day of the GW Bakery LJ Community. Beta-ed by Shenlong Deb (thanks!).

Duo stomped up the porch steps of the house he shared with his boyfriend. He was in a mood, a temper, a funk, or whatever else you wanted to call just being genuinely disgruntled with the world around him at this point in time. Life in general, sucked.

First, he had apparently forgotten to set his alarm last night. This resulted in Heero waking him up late. Heero had expressed that he had assumed that Duo had wanted to sleep in since he never forgot to set his alarm. Duo had snapped at him and stomped off to the bathroom.

Then, the car wouldn't start. Duo had banged his head repeatedly on the steering wheel, screaming obscenities at his dashboard. Turned out the battery was dead. So he went to catch the bus, only to find out he had missed the last one for this stop in the morning. That meant he had been forced to let Heero drive him to work.

All this resulted in him being about and hour and a half late to work at the scrap yard. When he finally got there he had phone messages and emails that demanded his immediate attention. Somewhere in the midst of answering them all, an employee had burned his hand with a welding torch. Duo had been forced to call an ambulance, and that resulted in a mountain of paperwork. All in all, he had gotten absolutely nothing done at work today.

Now it was late, he had caught the last bus home and he was starving. He also realized he was in pretty bad need of a shower. He hoped to hell that Heero had taken pity on him and cooked already. Duo rapped on the door twice, paused, kicked it twice, paused, and knocked one more time. Some habits were just hard to break; and Heero had a lot of habits. Duo fitted his key into the lock and turned it. He opened the door…

And found nothing.

&&&

"Heero? I'm home, finally. Fucking work nearly killed me today! That damned Robby torched his hand, the stupid rookie. I never should've hired him. Heero? You here?" Duo looked around the house and could not see his boyfriend anywhere. He walked back into the kitchen and finally saw an envelope with his name on it sitting next to the coffee maker. Duo's heart sunk, but he opened the envelope anyway. The paper inside it was thin and elegant.

'Your car battery is fixed. Please drive to Primo's and see the host or hostess,' Heero's neat lettering told him. Duo frowned briefly but grabbed his keys anyway. It looked like he was going to have to get take-out. He checked the garage briefly and saw that Heero's car was definitely not there. He wondered what was up.

As Duo drove he thought about his destination: Primo's. Best lasagna he had ever eaten, and it had been on his and Heero's first date. He remembered briefly how he had drunk way to much Chianti and had ended up falling asleep on Heero's shoulder in the cab they'd shared. That had been a fun night, and the first of many. He had been interested in Heero for so very long, and when Heero had finally given into his somewhat, overt proposals, Duo had been ecstatic. He had never actually thought Heero would be interested. He had shot the guy, twice, for Pete's sake!

Duo pulled into the parking lot at Primo's and locked the car carefully. He shoved his hands in the pockets of his black jeans and briefly wished he had taken the time to change. He opened the double glass doors and walked up to the wooden stand the host or hostess occupied. Tonight it was a hostess, and her name was Nicole.

"Say, Nicole? My name's Duo Maxwell. I was told –," Duo was cut off by another envelope being shoved into his hand, along with a very violet blue rose.

"Your boyfriend's a really nice guy," she smiled. Nice? Heero? Duo was puzzled but nodded his thanks and left.

Back in the car Duo turned on the overhead light and opened the envelope.

'Drive to the North River Park. Find the tree. Yes, that tree,' this note instructed. Duo smiled. He did know that tree. It was the very tree that Heero had first kissed him under. They had been jogging together one morning and had stopped to take a drink of water. Heero had told Duo that there was one thing he had been dying to know. When Duo had inquired as to just what that was, Heero had leaned in and kissed him. Duo still remembered how it felt, and the way he'd melted into it. He had wanted that kiss more than anything, and it had stayed with him.

Duo pulled into the deserted parking lot and got out. He jogged quickly to the tree. Sure enough, there was an envelope pinned to it with one of his favorite knives. He pulled out the knife and then noticed what was underneath the envelope. It was their initials.

'H.Y. & D.M.'

Duo did not know what to do about that. It was so….not Heero. It was not something he ever saw Heero doing. It was sentimental, it was gushy, and it was just plain romantic. And for some reason it brought the hugest smile to Duo's face. Those carved initials all of a sudden caused a suspicious wetness to form behind his eyelids. He blinked and the wetness went away, but the feeling of being loved did not. He opened the envelope and read it under the light of a park lamp.

'Go to The Drunk Skunk. Bart has something for you.'

The Drunk Skunk would be the bar they spent a lot of spare time at. It was about three blocks away from home. They stopped there a lot to drink a few beers, socialize, and to shoot pool. Bart would be the obligatory, scary bouncer that kept the underage kids away. Duo got back in the car and gave the tree one last, wistful glance as he took off.

It was a Tuesday, and the bar was not all that busy. Bart sat on a stool right outside the door, chewing his favorite gum and looking around. He smiled a rough smile as Duo pulled up.

"That boyfriend of mine been 'round, Bart?" Duo asked as he walked up. He shook Bart's hand and then accepted yet another envelope, this one coming with another beautiful rose.

"He was 'round here a little while back. He just told me to give you that when you came by," Bart explained. Duo thanked him and went back to the car.

The Drunk Skunk was where he had asked Heero to move in with him. They had been dating for a few months, but Heero had stayed with Duo a lot more than he had stayed at his own home. He remembered the epiphany he'd had and how, when he'd voiced it, Heero seemed to look almost amazed. It was like a light had been turned on for him, and Duo had no idea how he had done that. The smile that had shown up on Heero's face had been worth more than any amount of money to Duo. He opened the envelope in the car and read it.

'I'm at home now.'

Duo smiled and turned on the car. With a smile on his face he began to drive the few more blocks home. Home to Heero.

&&&

Duo found himself back where he had started from, on his front porch. He repeated the special knock from earlier and unlocked the door. When he stepped inside he was surprised to find everything to be very anticlimactic: no flowers, no candles, no romantic music. What had he expected? This was Heero, not Casanova.

Heero emerged from the kitchen, holding two glasses of red wine. He smiled at Duo and offered him one. Duo took it and watched him warily. He sipped the wine. Merlot.

"Well?" Duo asked.

"Well what?" Heero replied, sitting down on their sofa.

"I've been driving all over, and I come back to wine and nothing else?" Duo asked.

"No. Not nothing," Heero tossed something at Duo. Duo caught it and was amazed to find that he was holding a deep red velvet jewelers box. He looked repeatedly at the box and then Heero. Heero calmly sipped his wine and waited for Duo.

Duo carefully opened the box after setting down all the envelopes and gifts on the side table next to the sofa. Heero's face flushed slightly as he heard Duo's small gasp of surprise.

"Is this what I think it is?" Duo asked, his voice tightly controlled to keep from crying.

"Yes," Heero answered. Duo sat down next to him and stared at the box contents some more.

"Aren't you supposed to get down on one knee or something?" Duo asked without looking at him.

"Duo, I am not good with words, and I am even worse at all these traditional things. It was hard enough to even pick the thing out and plan the giving of it. Do not make me get down on my knees," Heero sighed, "Look, if you don't want it give it back."

"Like hell I don't want it! Of course I want it. Do you want this?" Duo asked as he finally pulled the item from the box.

"I would not have given it to you if I did not," Heero pointed out.

"Yeah, you wouldn't. Okay then, so what's the deal?" Duo asked.

"Deal?" Heero replied, confused.

"Who has to be the wife?" Duo asked, amused with the situation.

"Is that a yes?" Heero queried, hopeful.

"Damn straight, Heero Yuy. Yes," Duo placed the platinum and sapphire ring on his left hand and then kissed his fiancé passionately.

When Duo finally came up for air he had forgotten all about Robby and the torch, the car and the dead battery, and the stupid municipal bus system. He forgot about everything that was so small and petty. Sometimes his life was….

Well, it was just the type of life worth living.

-The End-


End file.
